The present invention relates to sport balls which contain mechanisms for inflating or adding pressure to the balls.
Conventional inflatable sport balls, such as basketballs, footballs, soccer balls, volley balls and playground balls, are inflated through a traditional inflation valve using a separate inflation needle that is inserted into and through a self-sealing inflation valve. A separate pump, such as a traditional bicycle pump, is connected to the inflation needle and the ball is inflated using the pump. The inflation needle is then withdrawn from the inflation valve which self-seals to maintain the pressure. This system works fine until the sport ball needs inflation or a pressure increase and a needle and/or pump are not readily available.
The present invention provides a sport ball which has a self-contained inflation mechanism. The object is to be able to inflate or add pressure to a sport ball without the need for separate inflation equipment such as a separate inflation needle and pump. Specifically, the invention relates to a sport ball which has a self-contained, manually operable pumping chamber which pumps ambient air into the ball to achieve the desired pressure. More specifically, the pumping chamber includes means for admitting ambient air into the chamber and means for forcing that air from the chamber through one-way valve means into the interior volume of the ball.